Deep Silver has issued the first patch for S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Clear Sky, bringing to v1.01 the official prequel to the survival FPS game S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Shadow of Chernobyl. The patch optimizes the performance of the game by approximately 5%. In addition to that, the update improves the overall stability of the game and fixes potential load/save issues. Further, the balancing of the multiplayer mode has been changed.

Yet, for all its failings, Clear Sky is still built over S.T.A.L.K.E.R.'s mighty framework, and even in its lowest moments it can't topple that proud structure. There is horror, there is beauty (though sadly the newly-enhanced lighting model brings even a top-tier graphics card to its knees, so you'll end up back on the older visual settings) and there is often thrilling gunplay. It's not an RPG but it is playing in Deus Ex and System Shock 2's territory to a certain extent -- an FPS where you call your character's shots, in a world you can carve something like your own path through. Again, it may lack BioShock's style but it realises more of its promises. Sure, there's no meaningful character interaction to speak of, but it's an effective and expansive combat and trading model. Stalker has quieter environments, increasing tension and unease by biding its time between combat and setpieces. Plus, the relative silence of its NPCs make it the better game than Clear Sky by far, but if this one is your first visit to the Zone, it'll still work much of its magic on you. Its successes are the first S.T.A.L.K.E.R.'s successes, not its own. For that reason alone, this is disappointment rather than disaster -- but it is a crushing disappointment.